- Wall Street indices finished yesterday's trading slightly higher. S&P 500 gained 0.16%, Nasdaq added 0.07% and Dow Jones jumped 0.47%. Small-cap Russell 2000 traded around 0.2% higher
- Indices from Asia-Pacific traded mostly lower today - Nikkei dropped 0.3%, S&P/ASX 200 was down 0.7%, Kospi traded flat while Nifty 50 jumped 0.6%. Indices from China traded 0.4-1.0% lower
- DAX futures point to a more or less flat opening of the European cash session today
- Talks between Chinese President Xi and US President Biden on the sidelines of APEC summit lasted around 4 hours and touched on a wide range of topics
- Two leaders discussed Taiwan, Ukraine, Israel-Gaza, military-to-military communication and AI among others
- Chinese President Xi Jinping said after meeting with US President Biden that there is plenty of room for US-China cooperation and that China wants to be a partner and friend of the United States
- Xi also said that China has no plans for a military action against Taiwan in coming years
- US Commerce Secretary Raimondo said that the United States seeks to deescalate tensions with China
- US Senate approve a temporary funding bill to avoid government shutdown for 2 months. US House passed the bill on Tuesday. Funding bill now awaits signature from US President Joe Biden
- Japanese exports increased 1.6% YoY in October (exp. 1.2% YoY) while imports plunged 12.5% YoY (exp. -12.2% YoY)
- Japanese machinery orders increased 1.4% MoM in September (exp. 1.0% MoM)
- Australian employment increased by 55k in October (exp. +21.4k), driven by a 38k jump in part-time employment. Unemployment rate increased from 3.6 to 3.7% (exp. 3.7%)
- Major cryptocurrencies are trading mixed - Bitcoin drops 0.8%, Ripple declines 0.4% Ethereum gains 0.2% and Dogecoin adds 0.4%
- Oil is trading 0.5% lower on the day while US natural gas prices trade flat
- Precious metals gains - gold and silver trade 0.3% higher, platinum adds 0.2% and palladium rallies 1.6%
- USD and EUR are the best performing major currencies, while AUD and NZD lag the most
In spite of a rather solid Australian jobs report, AUDUSD is trading lower today. The move lower on the pair is driven by an overnight USD strengthening. Source: xStation5
